


Long Night, Doctor

by waterloosunset123



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt, Emotional Manipulation, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Obviously The Master is a psychopath., Old Enemies., Old Friends., Post Episode: s03e12 The Sound of Drums, The Doctor is wise., The Master actually has emotions about Gallifrey., Threats of Violence.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-15
Updated: 2016-05-15
Packaged: 2018-04-26 23:45:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,789
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5025349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/waterloosunset123/pseuds/waterloosunset123
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>"Oh, but they broke your hearts, didn't they, those Toclafane, ever since you worked out what they really are."</em><br/>In which The Doctor figures it out. His insane childhood best friend then tries to manipulate him every which way into joining him on forging the New Time Lord Empire. They're both astoundingly stubborn about it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Long Night, Doctor

**Author's Note:**

> Shifting POV. Third Person. Set in Series 3 between "The Sound of Drums" and "Last of The Time Lords."

**T** HE MASTER approached The Doctor’s tent in the dark, footsteps slow and heavy. He kicked the dog bowl on the floor, making a rattling noise that made The Doctor jump awake.

“Oh, good evening, Doctor,” he said. “I apologize. It’s this new body. Itchy little thing.” 

But The Doctor didn’t respond. Not even a little.

So The Master took his time: he sat by the entrance of the tent, crosslegged. Played a rhythm on the floor with his hands.

“I _really_ didn’t expect regeneration, of course," he said. "Shooting me - that horrid thing. Frankly, I didn’t think she’d have the guts.” He smiled crookedly and proceeded to inject a chilly amiability in his tone. “Enough about me, now. I don’t like you being all silent.”

“Why are you here?” interjected The Doctor, low and even, with a hint of exasperation.

“Same-old, same-old. I wanted to catch up.”

The Doctor kept his eyes glued to the fabric of the tent, lips shut.

“Come on, Doctor. We’re so _good_ at the banter, you and I. Always have been. You can’t just throw that all away. Not after so many centuries. It’s tradition!”

He waited in vain for a reply.

“Seriously? Not even a teensy _tête-à-tête_? A little bit of a squabble? Humour me. For old times’ sake, eh, Theta?” Silence.  “No?”

“I have only one thing to say.”

“My dear Doctor, remember, saying stupid things like that only gets Jack killed. Again.” The Master was practically whispering in The Doctor’s ear, now. “Shot at, stabbed, electrocuted, drowned, poisoned into oblivion, burned, skinned. So many exciting possibilities. So do me a favour, and shut up.'"

The Doctor went mute by The Master’s side.

“Good boy.” He seemed to relax, whilst The Doctor had gone back to shutting down. “Did I tell you?” he asked, “I went back to Utopia. With Lucy. The whole Universe was dying, you know, and those humans… They’re so - what's the phrase I'm looking for? - willing to kill. I can see why you like them.”

The Doctor finally looked at The Master. It wasn’t often the Oncoming Storm was shaken, but The Master saw it now, in his eyes. Bone-deep fear, glistening. For confirmation, The Master touched his rival's arm. There it was, the anger and stress flooding the other's mind, and his hearts. And The Master loved it. Oh, he loved it so much he was high on it. He could tell him, finally come clean, and watch him squirm. On the other hand, going off on a tangent would feel so incomparably delicious now that The Doctor wanted nothing but resolution for his concerns.

And he was _not_ going to pass that up. “Lucy was _awestruck_ ," he noted, deriving glee from the anxiety playing out on his oldest rival's face. "Hopeless and beautiful, she said. That part’s true, of course, no denying that. Millions of galaxies. Just gone. So fast it takes your breath away. Anyway, she was useful, I suppose: almost lends credence to your confounding obsession with Earth girls.”

The Master reached towards a lamp by the side of the tent and turned it on. He wanted -- no, _needed_ \-- to see The Doctor’s face, now. “There, that’s much better. And while we’re on the subject of Earth girls, I have to tell you: you are a _horrible_ friend, and I’m _not_ just talking from personal experience. See, I checked your Data Core, and since the War, it honestly surprised me to find you have only had _one_ person on board long-term, besides the good doctor Jones and the freak. And this girl: she absorbs the Time Vortex itself to save _you_ , and what does she get for her troubles? _Stuck_ in a parallel universe, that’s what. And they say _I’m_ evil.”

The Doctor turned to him, a deeply sad expression in his wrinkled features. “You really don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said, flatly.

“Of _course_ , I do. I’d send pests to another dimension, too – if I could.” His giddy smile remained for an instant only before his face went serious. “I’m sure if we worked together, I could do you the kindness of helping you get her back. I have a Paradox Machine, Doctor. If you joined me, I believe we could come up with a clever way of unfreezing the coordinates, and saving her. You’d like that, I’m sure. I know how attached you get to your pets.”

The answer came instantaneously, in a whisper. “Never.”

“Are you sure?”

There was no reply.

“Don’t you miss her, Doctor?”

The Doctor raised his voice, and every word was punctuated. “What happened in Utopia?”

The Master couldn’t help but smile. A nerve had definitely been hit and he was in heaven.

“The Toclafane,” he confessed at last. “I engineered them.” He let out a soft, high-pitched laugh.

“What are they?”

“Well, let's see. Why would I _need_ a Paradox Machine? I know you can do this. Come on.”

Almost immediately, The Doctor’s face fell.

“ _And_ there it is! Want to see if you got it right?”

“No,” the other said, horrified.

“Too bad. This is my favourite part: humans that come back to kill their own ancestors. Ta-da! Isn't that brilliant? Not that they ever needed much prodding in the violence department to begin with, but, still. Oh, the Paradox Machine really is a beauty, isn’t she? Some of my best work. All I had was your useless Type 40, but I _still_ managed to turn it into a work of art.”

As scheduled, in that moment, The Doctor looked utterly and satisfyingly devastated. Didn’t even attempt to hide it. The Master savoured it with every ounce of blood he had before he spoke again.

“Oh, come on, Doctor, cheer up. I’ll have control of everything soon, and maybe when there’s a new Gallifrey out there and I preside over the Time Lords, if you’re a good boy, I’ll be merciful. And kill you for good.”

The Doctor’s response was so low, The Master didn’t hear it at first.

“What’s that?”

“I said you never could.” He had the audacity to look The Master straight in the eye and speak up. “It’s pathetic, really... _Literally_ centuries of trying... aren’t you tired by now?” The Master began to reply but was cut off as the other’s smile and his speech grew confident despite the obvious strain on his old body. “Best part is,” The Doctor said, “even now –no sonic, no exit, no one to hear me scream out my last seconds in this body— and you’re still doubting, still _scared_ I’ll pull a trick last-minute and call checkmate like I always have. The way you just have to have me monitored at all times. The way you came tonight just to check on me personally. You still think, still _know_ , I’m dangerous. Even now. And as long as _that’s_ true, it’s gotta be said, yeah? Even if it kills me, you _know_ I’ll stop you. Master.”

The Master swiftly grabbed The Doctor by his shirt collar. “Go on,” he spat derisively through gritted teeth. “Stop me.” They stared at each other for a moment, the manic despot and the tired old prisoner, both hit by a sad, now-ancient notion– they remained enemies still. But in the very same way, they remained friends as well, couldn’t help but, and they both knew it. The Master let go.

In the silence that ensued, however, The Doctor suddenly seemed to understand something hidden in The Master's ireful expression, something deep and muddy only someone who had known him as long as he had could.

"I'm sorry," he whispered.

"I _told_ you—"

"About Gallifrey. There was no other way. Believe me, I tried, and—"

"Never mind," The Master said. "It will be remedied soon, Doctor. Time rewritten. No drums, no War, no Daleks. Doesn't it sound beautiful?"

To The Doctor, it did. But he wouldn’t give the other the satisfaction. "Here's the thing," he said. “You can grieve, shout, and act out all you like. 'Cause I know I did." There was sympathy, a little of it, in The Doctor's voice now. It made The Master's skin crawl to be read so accurately. There was silence for a moment, and The Doctor continued. "If you're set on seeing this little plan through, though, I won't just stand by and watch."

"Meaning what? You're _content_ with it all? Last of the Time Lords?" He paused and whispered, "think of it. We could restore them all together, you and I." 

"Not like this."

"Who cares how, Doctor? _Really_ , who? Our planet's gone."

"I know."

"All those people..."

The Doctor found it jarring to hear something like heartbroken compassion coming from The Master's lips. Especially at that moment. He doubted the other was burdened with many emotions at all, actually. But something in the cadence of The Master's voice was so sincere, something in his eyes so defeated, The Doctor nearly believed for a moment that Utopia and the Valiant and the Toclafane were only misdirected grief, instead of misdirected grief _plus_ the usual psychopathy. He wanted to believe it. He didn't. 

So he kept silent until The Master spoke again.

"Even the _children_?"

A whisper. "Yeah."

The Master scratched his head, looking rattled, but otherwise no worse for wear. "How do you _live_ with it?"

There was only one answer to that. "I don't."

"We can bring them back, Doctor. Prevent it all from happening. The New Empire."

"No."

"How long since you went to the Chanting Halls of the Meditation Dome, eh? Saw the lights in the south of the mount beyond Arcadia, or the Raging Silver Waterfalls on Solitude? Answer me that."

“Stop."

"How long since you last saw your mother?" Again, pin-point accuracy on the nerve-hitting; The Master suddenly had him on the ropes. "When I met her," The Master commented coldly, "I didn't take her for the sort of woman who would be terribly glad to have a mass murderer for a son."

The reply was instantaneous. "Neither would yours."

They stared at each other again, and The Master was surprised to see The Doctor smile. If only for a fraction of a second. The Master nearly reciprocated.

"So?" he asked.

"Can't break the laws of time."

The Master brusquely pushed the other down and backed away. "There you go again. What's the use of being a Time Lord if you—"

"Consider this your warning. You won't get away with it. Seriously. None of it."

"Yeah?” He stood up and turned off the light. “We'll see."

"And how many times have I heard _that_ , I wonder?"

“Good night, Doctor.”

 He walked away slowly, into the lift. Every step rung out into the long night.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Any feedback at all is most welcome.  
> P.S. I had a blast writing The Master for the first time!  
> 24-APRIL-2016. Minor re-writes.   
> 15-MAY-2016. Very minor re-writes. Final version.


End file.
